Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Summer Breeze

This time of year brought this memory to mind. Our family moved from the city Chicago, to the suburb of Glencoe when we were still in the last years of elementary school. Our house was about a half mile from Lake Michigan. We would take a short cut and hike through a ravine that led to beach. There was a sand bar about fifty yards out and Michael wanted to swim to it. I was afraid that I would run out of gas and told him so. "Don't worry Allie, don't worry I will stay right next to you."Out we went and about half way there I began to panic. My brother true to his word,went under water and held me up until I caught my breath. Once we got to the sand bar Michael was laughing and excitedly saying, "you did really well." You just got to love him.AB

5 comments:

Hello Allen,i'm so happy every time to read some good memories about Mike.I recently had the great chance to talk with mr Fabio Treves of the Treves Blues Band, an italian blues armonicist who recorded with Mike a live album in Turin back in 1980.He told me how a great hearted man was Mike made of genius and simplicity. I was wandering on what Mike would have taught about Italy, if he liked the places or met some friends here and maybe told you or his friends something about that trip.Hope I didn't hurt you with this post,I know the diggin in the past can be incredibly hard, i keep on learning, appreciating and loving Mike's music and feelings day by day,more and more.Thanky you very much,ciaofilippo, Como - Italy

Dear Filippo,Thank you for your interest in Michael. Fabio did a great Blues CD and plays a mean harp. It just goes to prove that music is the universal language, be it out of Italy or Chicago. I don't recall Michael speaking directly about his experiences in Italy, but I saw a tape of a live performance and it is obvious that he loved the people and played his ass off. Because he was in another country he adopted a blues man type persona that was his attempt at authenticating his blues man image. Michael loved food and as you know Italy has the best. What I perceived from the film was a really happy and excited brother delighting in sharing his talents.These recollections of Michael are the best to remember. My sincere thanks to you again for reminding me of them.Allen B

I am unable to translate the posts in Chinese and if possible please respond in English. Bob Sarles of Raven Productions is putting the finishing touches on the Mike Bloomfield documentary and you won't be disappointed. Bob Jones who played with Michael for several years has completed a CD dedicated to Michael and Dave Shorey. Bob and his band are excellent musicians and play their asses off. When the CD is released we will have much more to report on Michael's site. Just to be clear if anyone abuses this site in anyway I will have to shut it down.Allen Bloomfield

Hi Allen:Thanks for the update on the Sarles documentary. I wrote Bob a few years ago when I was living in the Bay Area, and he said he was in the process of working on it. I can't wait to see it. As for the spam and the ridiculous porn pitches, you might want to see (if you wish) about perhaps changing the setting for your comments section to where you can moderate posts before they're published. I've worked on blogs in Blogger and have used that so I don't have spam published on them.